In my post last week I talked about making New Years Resolutions. Although I’ve never been one to make them in the past, I decided to go in a new direction and set some goals for the year ahead. I set 5 goals for my family life and 5 goals for my personal growth and development. The latter 5 were:
- Increase blog posts to a minimum of twice per week.
- Open an online shop to increase household funds so that saving for a home will be more achievable.
- Change direction of Mum Life Stories blog to make it more inclusive.
- Finish writing at least one novel.
- Find a balance between work and family life.
Straight up, you can see number 1 isn’t happening yet as it’s been a week since my last post. I still have 51 weeks left though so I’m optimistic, especially since I’ve at least gotten the ball rolling on number 2, quite proud of myself I must say (she grins from ear to ear), but as promised it’s number 3 that I want to talk to you about.
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Confession Time
I’ll be honest, when I first began this blog, I was looking for a way to get an audience for my writing. I loved writing fiction and had been getting a lot of positive feedback, but was failing miserably to win any short story competitions (not from lack of serious effort) apart from one little micro story competition on Sweek. I called out for writers, etc to submit stories and ran Facebook ads to get their attention but only got a couple of submissions. I really wanted the blog to incorporate other writers and stories about Mums that would inspire my readers but I seemed to be hitting a dead end. I was starting to struggle to come up with ideas for posts and getting time to write fiction was proving difficult so I was seriously beginning to worry that I would have to give up on the blog all together.
Then, I was scrolling through Instagram, looking at various posts from other mums talking about the raw realities of motherhood and trying to balance this chaos with other aspects of life like extended family, hobbies, careers, business’ etc etc. Some of these women were very successful in their endeavours, some simply making a living, some making a lot of money, some famous and some just appearing to be living the ultimate happy life, but after reading their stories it was plain to see that they were constantly working and constantly exhausted like every other mother out there. I realised that we are all the same, all doing our best to get by and to find balance in what needs to be done and what we want to do. The only difference is that some women are living their dreams and others are stuck, not sure of where to start on the road to living their dreams, I was!
I realised that although there are a lot of women out there who love fiction (who wouldn’t? I mean it’s an escape from reality isn’t it?), its not that motivational when it comes to real life and offers no real tangible advice or encouragement on how to chase your dreams, or how to find balance in your life or how to dig down and find the courage for these things.
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New Direction
So after this epiphany of sorts I decided that the most productive, helpful course of action was to ease up (but only a little) on the fiction and bring more real, true-to-life stories about real mums your way. Once a month I will be sharing a story with you based on interview questions with 1 amazing mum who’s fought against the odds, overcome obstacles, chased her dreams, or just plain survived what life has thrown her way.
I hope and pray that you will all find inspiration and encouragement to keep going, fighting the good fight, enjoying your life and circumstances and chasing your own dreams.
Now, my call to action.
A lot of you out there, if not all of you, have amazing stories to tell but do not consider yourselves to be writers of any description. I am sure this is not true but I will humour you and offer my writing skills to tell your valuable story. I have one awesome story underway already (read here) but am looking for more wonderful women LIKE YOU, to interview for upcoming stories.
If you’ve ever thought to yourself “Man, they could write a book about my life” or “Geez my life would make a great movie” then I’d love to hear from you. I need inspirational stories about how you’ve overcome an obstacle, survived a drama/tragedy, reached your goals and/or dreams, contributed to the world and/or society, found balance in your life or just simply found a way to enjoy all that you have despite your circumstances, etc.
If you have a story to tell and would love to be featured on my blog in a article written about you by moi, then please send me an email at mumlifestories@gmail.com with your name, country of origin and 100 words or less, briefly outlining your story.
Please read the terms and conditions and indicate in your email that you agree to these terms and conditions.
All mums featured in these stories will have the opportunity to submit for inclusion, any links to websites or social media accounts promoting themselves or their business’. So it’s a win/win. You get promoted and we get an awesome, inspiring story to share with and encourage hundreds (hopefully thousands) of Mums now and in the Future.
Can’t wait to share these amazing Mum Life Stories with you soon!
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